“God,” she said, “that’s no way to drink—”
“Why?” he asked innocently.
“You just sip it. It’ll knock you out if you don’t,” she explained, studying him with a frown.
“I don’t drink,” he mumbled, coughing.
“Oh, you drink all right,” she said. Then, reflectively: “Say, maybe you oughtn’t to drink, if you drink like that.”
“I’m all right.”
She sat again and held her glass. He saw that a part of her robe had fallen off her crossed legs, leaving a bare strip of thigh showing. He kept his eyes on the floor.
“Let’s get back to Tony,” she said after taking a sip out of her glass. “Tony’s dead. I’m sorry...But he was an awful burden to me. I admit it. But I had nothing to do with his falling...I’d gotten in at four o’clock and was dead tired, and then his yelling wouldn’t let me sleep. Erskine, I’m no mother. How could I be a mother and work nights in a nightclub? I’m not complaining or excusing myself. It’s just the way things are; that’s all...I was always trying to think of what to do with Tony. I knew I wasn’t doing what I should. I wanted to put him in a home, but he got hysterical and wouldn’t go. So I kept him. But I never would’ve killed ‘im. Now, why do you say that I did?”
He wanted to reach out and slap her; instead, he sat heavily upon the bed.
“You’ve got some reason for saying that I killed ‘im,” she went on. She sucked deeply on her cigarette. “Erskine, did you bother Tony in some way?”
“What in God’s name do you mean?” he demanded, knowing full well what she meant.
“Did you frighten Tony in some way?”
“Only in the way you frightened him,” he muttered, rising and turning from her.
“I don’t get you. What are you talking about? Why do you keep accusing me?”
Erskine felt that now was the time to tell her. He was trembling. By God, he’d tell her...
“Erskine, look, I’m not accusing you of anything. But if you know anything, tell me...”
“Are you hinting at blackmail?” he demanded, glaring at her.
She reddened with shock.
“What would I blackmail you about?” she countered. “I hadn’t thought of anything like that. But was that why you offered to marry me? To keep me silent? To cover up something? To make it impossible for me to suspect anything about you?” Her eyelids fluttered as she thought. “Say, how did that blood get on my newspaper? You didn’t want me to tell that to the police! I remember now! You tried to make me believe that Tony had hurt himself, that everybody knew that Tony was scared of me—”
“You are glad that Tony’s dead!” he thundered at her.
“I’m not,” she defended herself quietly. “But why are you trying so hard to make me guilty of something? I’m still waiting for you to tell me what happened! And I’ve been waiting all along...Instead, you got cold feet and told me that you loved me...Were you going to marry me to keep from telling me?”
He came to her, nodding his head affirmatively, and demanded: “How much money do you want?”
“I’m not asking you for anything,” she said, speaking without rancor or surprise.
“But you were going to marry me, weren’t you?”
“Frankly, I doubt it,” she said, pouring herself another drink. “But why are you accusing me of killing Tony, Erskine? Don’t try to wriggle out of answering...”
“You brought Tony up in a way that made him scared of certain things,” Erskine said sheepishly, hesitantly.
“What on earth are you saying?” Her mouth hung open.
Her right leg was bare to the thigh now and he could see the tip of the nipple of one of her breasts, and he knew that she was utterly unaware of it.
“You had no damned business having a child,” he growled savagely.
“That may well be,” she agreed readily.
“It was because Tony had seen you as you are now, and perhaps in a worse state, that he fell,” Erskine explained.
“What do you mean? Drunk?”
“NO. NAKED!” he screamed at her, thrusting his face within a few inches of hers.
“Naked?” she repeated the word wonderingly, shrinking from him.
“Yes. Naked...”
She glanced down at herself, then hastily drew her robe together.
“Like this?” she asked, then bent forward and burst into a loud laugh. “Are you stupid? You’re funny, really!”
“He saw more than that,” Erskine snarled, waving his finger in her face.
“What in hell are you talking about?” she demanded, her face growing pale with anger.
He paced to and fro, then whirled on her, his hate breaking forth in a torrent of words to lash at her, to humble her, to break her down so that he could love her, master her, have his say-so about her. As he talked his face flamed a dark red and he banged both of his fists repeatedly on the top of his dresser.
“Mabel!” he shouted. “By God, I’m going to make you understand this, even if it’s the last thing you’ll ever understand on this earth, see? YOU KILLED TONY! How? Like this...You had let Tony see you naked many times, naked and making love to men, many men...Tony told me so! I swear it! That poor child couldn’t understand what he saw. You were so careless, so stupid, so inhuman, so brutal that you thought that a child could look right at such as that without its influencing him! How could you do that? Tony didn’t understand what was happening when you let him see you making love to men...Maybe you were too drunk to care—I don’t know. But Tony thought the men were fighting you...And you’ll never understand how scared he was of that...He thought of it night and day; he dreamed about it; he tried to find out what it meant; he lived in terror of it...He couldn’t interpret it in terms that made sense to him. It was just a picture of violence, violence for no reason that he could accept or understand...I swear to you that this is true, Mabel. Your son was terrified of naked people, naked men in particular...You made him feel that if he ever saw a naked man, he had to run for his life...for he didn’t want that violence, that fighting to happen to him...Tony told me that he didn’t even want to grow up to be a man, because he felt that he’d have to fight—he called it fighting!—women like his mother...Mabel, you crushed that child; you killed him even before he fell from that balcony...Aw, you sneer at me, huh?
“But, listen...That morning I tried to get my Sunday paper from the hallway, see? I was naked. I was about to take a shower. I opened my door to pick up the paper and the door slammed shut in my face and I was locked out. I didn’t know what to do. I was terrified, embarrassed...Naked, I rode down in the elevator to try to get hold of Westerman and ask him to unlock my door...But there were too many people about...Then I thought of climbing back into my apartment through my bathroom window...I ran to the balcony...Before I knew it, I was there and Tony was looking at me...He went white in the face...He was scared, scared...It all happened so quickly that I didn’t have time to think of what to do or say...He was standing on top of his hobbyhorse, and he fell, thinking that something was about to happen to him...He thought that I was going to fight him...Understand? I didn’t touch Tony, so help me God! I didn’t say one word to him, and I swear it! The whole thing happened in ten seconds or less...What Tony had seen you do, and he’d seen you do it many times, made him frightened and he fell; trying to run, he fell; trying to keep what he’d seen happen to you from happening to him, he fell...
“He tried to grab hold of that iron railing...I was leaning against that railing; I’d fallen against it. That damned hobbyhorse was leaning against the railing too. Then Tony, in falling from the hobbyhorse, tried to grab that railing to save himself. That was what pulled that railing out of the wall...Now, do you understand? Have you got sense enough, understanding enough, imagination enough to know what you’ve done?” Erskine’s face was contorted with fury and flecks of foam stood at the comers of his lips.
Mabel’s eyes were riveted upon his face. She was completely
rattled. The total picture had been presented too brutally and suddenly for her to grasp it. Red blotches appeared on the skin of her face and throat. Then, suddenly, the general sense of it struck her and she jumped to her feet.
“You sonofabitch!” she screamed. “My God...It’s that Mrs. Westerman who’s got your head all twisted...Why, I was alone when Tony fell...I’d had some company; yes...A friend of mine saw me home; but he’d gone...Tony wasn’t even in the room when my friend was there—”
“No; no...you stupid fool! You’re so sunk in muck that you can’t understand anything any more! I’m talking about what Tony saw you do before that morning! Many times and many mornings before that!”
Mabel’s face suddenly seemed washed of its humanity. She sprang forward like a tigress and her lips curled in fury.
“You can’t say that to me!” she screamed.
She hurled her glass at him; it missed his head and smashed against the wall behind him, shattering and sending a shower of whiskey over the room. Then she leaped at him and sent her open palm smacking against his undefended face.
“You dirty little whore!” Erskine roared.
He swung his fist and struck her on the shoulder; the force of the blow spun her round and she sprawled on the floor. For a second she was still, stunned. Then she began to weep.
“Ill kill you,” she sobbed. “You sonofabitch! You killed my child and now you’re trying to kill me...”
Clumsily, she clambered to her feet, clutching blindly at her robe which was sliding off her body.
“I’m going to report all of this to the police,” she panted. “You’re a pervert of some kind...You won’t get away...”
She fumbled with her robe. Erskine’s eyes were like cat’s eyes as he watched her. Then he advanced upon her with doubled fists. She backed off, terror masking her face. She crumpled to her knees, her robe falling open. In that moment she was his again. He was still, watching her. She crouched against a wall, her nude body trembling, her hands lifted to defend herself. Erskine relented, staring down at her trembling terror.
“Don’t hurt me; don’t hurt me, please,” she whimpered.
Yes. She was humble now...His tension slackened a bit. She’d been in flight from him, but his words had halted her and now she lay huddled against the wall, her naked body shivering, her lips begging for mercy..
“Mabel...I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hit you,” he gasped. “Listen, let’s talk about this...” He went toward her.
She stared at him without understanding; she thought that he was advancing to strike her again and she sprang, losing her robe completely. Feeling her nakedness, she stopped suddenly, looked down at herself in bleak dismay, clamped her knees together and covered her breasts with her spread fingers. Her mouth gaped to scream, but when she spoke, her voice was a stammered weeping:
“Don’t hurt me; don’t hurt me...”
“Mabel...Listen, for God’s sake! Try to listen...”
“What are you doing to me?” she whimpered.
“Listen...Don’t be scared.” He got her robe and flung it to her. “Put it on.”
With palsied movements she got awkwardly into her robe, watching him; her face was like that of a terrified child.
“Sit down,” he said. “God knows, I never hit a woman before in all my life...I’m sorry.” He covered his face with his hands.
She didn’t know what to do. She glanced at the door, then back to his face. She was trying to read his mind, then she seemed to decide to trust him once more. She sighed.
“Sit down; sit down, Mabel,” lie begged her. “I won’t hurt you...”
She edged toward a chair and sat. He backed off till his legs touched his bed; then he sank upon it, closed his eyes and rocked his head.
“Good God, Mabel,” he groaned. “Were both at fault in this...Be calm and try to understand. Please...There’s no sense in being wild. What’s happened has happened...That’s all. But we can try to understand what happened.” He lifted his eyes pleadingly to her. “The first thing to try to understand is that I’m telling you the truth about what happened to Tony...All right; I’m a damn fool for not telling what had happened in the first place...I was foolish! But it was such a freakish accident, such a silly accident that I was in a funk...I didn’t want to tell anybody about it. I-I thought t-they wouldn’t believe m-me...The last thing on earth I expected was for my door to slam shut in my face and lock me out, naked in that hallway...”
They both stared unseeingly toward each other in silence.
“Your door slammed...?” she asked at last in a timid voice; she looked at him, then off, frowning.
“Yes; I was locked out, naked...I couldn’t even break the door down—”
“Did your door slam very loud when it shut?” she asked.
“Like a rifle shot—”
“What time was that?”
“A little after seven-thirty; nearly eight, I think—”
“Then that’s what I heard,” she said wonderingly. “I thought that was Tony...It woke me up.”
The muscles of Erskine’s face relaxed a little. “Oh, thank God, you can understand maybe...Try to understand something...Be honest with yourself, Mabel. Look at this for what it simply is,” he begged her. “What killed poor Tony is what both of us did to him...Which of us is really responsible, who knows? All right; I am upon the balcony...But how could I know that Tony would react so?”
“Why didn’t you knock at my door?” she asked, her eyes round with the effort to comprehend.
His eyes grew sullen and he frowned. He bent forward and rested his elbows on his knees and cupped his chin in his hands.
“I didn’t dare, Mabel,” he confessed. “I didn’t know you...And I didn’t think about it. I was trying to dodge everybody...And I was wild, crazy, scared...What does one do in situations like that?”
“Yes; you wouldn’t think of doing a little simple thing like that,” she said and even managed a slow, rueful smile. “You’re very moral...” She shook her head. “You and Tony...You say you talked to Tony about this...?”
“He talked to me—”
“Oh, God, it’s all so sad and true it makes me sick,” she moaned.
“Be honest and try to understand...”
She lifted her head with a quick jerk.
“But why on earth didn’t you call Tony and tell him to get Westerman—?”
A tremor went through Erskine. He doubled his fists and jammed them against his eyes.
“Christ, I forgot that the child was on that balcony!” he exclaimed in horror. “I heard ‘im earlier, then he got quiet and I forgot ‘im.”
“Good God,” Mabel breathed. “Could such a thing happen?”
“It happened!” he swore fervently. “I pray for you to believe me; I beg you with all my heart...What do you want me to do to prove it? Look, Mabel, I’m so glad that all of this is out in the open at last. Keeping my mouth shut about this was like having a hot poker rammed in my heart! Listen, Mabel, let’s you and I go right now to the police station and tell them what happened...Let’s go and tell them everything. Right now!”
Mabel moaned and closed her eyes.
“God, Erskine, what good on earth would that do now?” she asked in a hopeless whisper. “I’d die on the spot if you told the police what you told me tonight...I’d die of shame.” She choked.
“But what ought we to do?” Erskine asked.
“Tony’s gone,” she wailed. “What did I do to my baby...?”
She caught hold of the hem of her robe and pressed it against her mouth in a gesture of convulsive grief, then she leaned forward in her chair. Her dark eyes were pits of fear as she lifted them slowly to Erskine’s face.
“D-do you t-think that he w-was scared of...scared of that, Erskine?” she asked in a broken voice.
“Yes, Mabel,” he told her. “Tony was alone, alone in a world he didn’t understand. He saw danger everywhere, even where there was no danger...Did you know that he was
even afraid to play with his toys?”
“Afraid of his toys?” She gulped. “Oh, God, Mrs. Westerman told me something about that once, but I didn’t believe her...I thought she was trying to insult me. Jesus, I shouldn’t have had a child...I’m no mother...” She keened: “He was scared of his little toys...”
“He could hardly play with them, Mabel,” Erskine explained sadly and gently. “He’d get scared and run off...Oh, I can’t explain it all, Mabel. Tony was obsessed with fear about everything. He didn’t understand what he saw you do, and he got it mixed up with things that didn’t have anything to do with it...Even his little airplanes were men and women fighting to make babies...At times he was so frightened of them that he couldn’t touch them.”
They were silent. Mabel sat, crushed. Beyond the window it was black night and a slight wind made the curtains tremble. The small clock on Erskine’s night table ticked loudly in the still room.
“Mabel,” Erskine called plaintively to her.
She opened her eyes and stared at him; there was only wonder, fear, pity, humility and a kind of dread in her now. He felt that she was his, only his now...He rose and went slowly to her and touched her shoulder. He thought that his breath would stop when her hand lifted itself and, hesitantly and tenderly, covered his own. He took her in his arms; he found himself weeping.
“I don’t understand anything any more,” she whispered through a dry throat. “What did I do to my child?”
“May God help you,” he told her. “Little Tony’s gone...I’ll do anything on this earth to try to make it up to you.”
They clung together, weeping.
“Mabel?”
“Yes?”
“I still love you,” he said. “Make any condition you want. I’ll accept it and abide by it. I’m in your hands. We both must go to the police and tell them about Tony...”
“No; no; no,” she cried, shutting her eyes.
“But I want to marry you, Mabel,” he said. “I need you...”
He felt her body shudder slightly in his arms.
“But I’m not for you, Erskine,” she whispered compassionately.
Savage Holiday Page 17